


Infamy

by Kantayra



Category: Smoke Series - Tanya Huff
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-01-01
Updated: 2008-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-19 02:56:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/196088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kantayra/pseuds/Kantayra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The paparazzi find out about Lee and Tony.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Infamy

**Author's Note:**

> This story was originally written for azarsuerte in Yuletide 2007.

Tony and Lee had had a plan for this. They’d discussed it one night over pizza and DVDs when they realized that far too many of their ‘dates’ had only been pizza and DVDs. The plan was simple: in the event of a press ambush, the two of them were to proudly stand together and reveal that Tony was Lee’s boyfriend.

However, when the situation finally arose and the camera was shoved in their face, things played out quite differently.

Tony froze, wide-eyed, clinging to Lee’s arm. Lee had given the cameras that smile that had stolen the hearts of thousands of middle-aged housewives, and then he’d gone out and said it:

“This is my boyfriend, Tony.”

It all went exactly according to plan, which was why Tony felt so guilty about the fact that he suddenly wanted nothing more than to punch Lee in the face. The circle of cameras swarmed around Tony, and Lee’s arm circled his waist, almost as a sort of counterattack, but Tony could barely feel it.

“How long have you and Lee been hiding that you’re gay?”

“Did Angela Verne know you and Lee were together while they were dating?”

“Were you the one who broke Lee and Angela up?”

“How much do you think that your relationship with Lee will damage his career?”

Tony blinked dumbly.

“We’re not answering any questions right now,” Lee answered smoothly, herding Tony over to the car. “You’ll all have to go through my agent.”

They’d almost made it to the car when a short reporter with a pointy nose and bushy black hair intercepted them. “Do you really think that, after all the models Lee has dated, you can turn him gay?” she demanded, microphone to Tony’s nose.

“I…don’t know?” Tony squeaked.

“Talk to my agent,” Lee demanded sternly, pulling Tony away to safety.

“How does it feel to know that thousands of women will see the papers tomorrow and hate you?” the persistent reporter demanded.

Tony’s jaw hung open in a thoroughly dumb matter. Several camera flares went off.

“Let’s get out of here.” Lee put the car into gear, and they fled the parking lot.

***

The next morning, they’d hit nearly every tabloid. Tony felt something very cold and painful sinking into his stomach as he passed page after page of pictures of him and Lee: Lee looking gorgeous and poised as always, and Tony looking stupid, vacant, and a bit on the chubby side. Ever his hair was messed up and was sticking out to one side in a ridiculous way. It was clear that one of the people in that picture didn’t belong within the glossy pages of a magazine, and the whole thing made Tony feel vaguely queasy.

By noon, the footage had been aired on half a dozen different cable programs. By three o’clock, he’d already made two ‘Worst Dressed’ lists.

“Just ignore them,” Lee said softly, coming up behind Tony on the couch and massaging his shoulders with just the right amount of strength.

It felt so good Tony wanted to scream.

“A bigger celebrity will do something idiotic within the next twenty-four hours,” Lee promised. “And then they’ll forget all about us.”

That evening, at ten o’clock, one of the stars of LOST got into a drunken bar fight in Hawaii.

“See?” Lee spooned up behind him as they went to bed that night. “I told you it would all work out.”

But, for some reason Tony didn’t really understand, he just felt worse. Even the comforting weight of Lee against his back and the regular rhythm of his breathing wasn’t enough to allow Tony to sleep that night.

***

The next day, the tabloids found out that Tony had been working as an Assistant Director in training on ‘Darkest Night.’ The frenzy of tabloid reporters returned anew, and Tony was barely able to elbow his way past them as he left Lee’s house that afternoon. From the questions he was asked, he wasn’t sure whether he’d only gotten the job by giving Lee sexual favors or whether his disastrous lack of experience on set was single-handedly responsible for the show’s low ratings. Possibly both at the same time.

Thankfully, they didn’t follow him to his afternoon gig, which was a bit of poltergeist work for an old roommate of Zev’s.

“Is there any room where the activity seems to be focused?” Tony asked, reaching out to try to sense any paranormal activity around them.

“The guest bedroom,” Zev’s friend Dave answered. “Hey… Don’t I know you from somewhere? You’re someone, aren’t you?”

Tony felt a headache coming on. “Everyone’s someone,” he said non-committally, opening up his laptop on the desk of the guest bedroom.

Dave snapped his fingers as he figured it out. “That’s it. You’re the boy toy of Mr. Bi-Curious.”

“Whatever,” Tony grumbled. There was definitely something wrong with that old painting of the hunt over the bed.

“Man, I can see how you gave in to the temptation. But: Ouch! I’m not sure I’d have the guts to be _that_ pretty boy’s experiment. I hope it’s worth it, man.”

Tony gritted his teeth. Across the room, a lamp shattered.

“See!” Dave yelped. “It’s got to be a poltergeist, right?”

Tony was pretty sure that particular act of destruction hadn’t been a poltergeist at all. “You’ve got something in your painting,” he informed Dave testily.

He didn’t answer Dave’s question. If he’d been asked before the media explosion, he’d have said that Lee was worth everything in the world. Now, he wasn’t so sure…

***

The best thing about spending the night at Lee’s was that Tony didn’t end up living off of leftover pizza crusts. Lee had this _thing_ about always cooking, especially when it came to big, scrumptious breakfasts. That morning, Lee had gone all out: eggs, bacon, pancakes, the whole nine yards.

Tony conceded, as he drowned himself in the special-ordered Columbian mocha blend that Lee gave him, that he’d been very silly of late, and he really loved Lee more than life itself after all.

That was before Lee sat down very carefully across from him and put a soothing hand on Tony’s knee. “I think it’s better than you hear this from me, rather than reading it in the tabloids,” he said sheepishly.

“Oh god, what have they done now?”

“Once they got your name, it was really only a matter of time before they started looking into your past,” Lee apologized.

Tony blanched. “What are they saying?” he asked weakly.

It turned out they knew _everything_. Not everything exactly, of course, but there were enough sordid details from Tony’s life on the streets back in Toronto that it wasn’t hard for them to find more than enough.

“Oh god, oh god…” Tony was pretty sure he was hyperventilating. He’d been so proud of all that he’d overcome and now to have it all thrown in his face again…

“I’m going to sic my lawyers on CelebNews,” Lee was furious. “No matter what you went through, you were _not_ a ‘crackwhore’.”

“Oh god…” Tony grabbed a paper bag from the counter and began breathing into it very slowly.

“Hey,” Lee said softly. “I know it’s hard, and offensive and intrusive. But you really can’t let it get to you. After all, you’re a powerful wizard, and they’re just a bunch of tabloid reporters.”

“Great. That just means that they can find out about the wizard thing, too,” Tony snapped, pulling away. “Soon I’ll be condemning you to hell in _two_ ways.”

Lee looked hurt for a moment, but he didn’t try to push. That just made Tony madder, because he’d spent all that time worrying how Lee would react to being outted, and Lee was handling everything like a pro while Tony was the one freaking out. It wasn’t even like it mattered so much to Tony: CB knew all about him. Lee’s career was the one who would really suffer from all this.

All it did was make Tony feel even worse that he couldn’t be as strong as Lee. After all, wasn’t that his job? He’d taken down shadowlords, spirits, and demons, but a few nosy reporters were going to take him down?

“I just…” Tony stood up abruptly. “I need to be alone for a while.”

***

Tony didn’t come back until late that night. He’d debated not coming back at all and just staying at his own place until the whole mess blew over. But, in the end, he realized that Lee wasn’t to blame for this, even if he was the one the tabloids were after. It wasn’t like Tony hadn’t had plenty of advanced warning, and Lee had only done what Tony wanted in the first place.

He arrived back at Lee’s, and thankfully the reporters were all gone for now. He and Lee had been running to and from the house as quickly as they could of late, so it was the first chance Tony had had to check the mail since yesterday afternoon. It was clear from the sheer volume of unknown addresses that the hate mailers had officially found them.

Tony flicked on the kitchen lights and dropped the stack of letters onto the table. Tony was willing to bet that Lee’s agent had gotten ten times this many at the office. With a roll of his eyes, Tony grabbed Lee’s gold-embossed letter opener and started reading through them.

 _Die, fags!_ Lovely.

 _I never liked your show anyway._ Charming.

 _How dare you corrupt the moral fiber of our children?_ followed, quite hilariously, by: _White Chapel Wedding Florists._

Lee came in on that one. “I wasn’t sure if you were coming home tonight.” He sounded scared.

Tony managed a half smile. “I almost didn’t.”

Lee nodded and moved to lean against the counter across from Tony. He fidgeted nervously with his hands and glanced at the letters on the table. Tony had still only opened about half of them.

“Look,” Lee began carefully, “if this is too much for you, I’ll understand. It’s just…” He took a deep breath, like he was fighting to maintain his cool for once. “This life isn’t for everyone,” he finally said in almost a whisper.

And, for the first time, Tony saw the flip side of the coin. Lee had always complained about the press, but then Lee was so slick with dealing with them, and a part of him really did enjoy the whole glamour of show biz. He couldn’t have been an actor if he didn’t.

However, that didn’t mean that it was all fun and games for Lee, either. Tony suddenly wondered how many times Lee had had to have this conversation with someone he loved. How many people had said no and walked out? How many more had said yes, but in the end really couldn’t handle it? Tony felt a real connection to Lee just then: the people Tony loved got attacked by rogue wizards bent on world domination, and the people Lee loved got attacked by paparazzi. Now that Tony had been through the latter, he was starting to think that he’d gotten off easy.

“I can’t leave you now,” Tony insisted instead. “Then, how am I going to see the expression on Brenda’s face when we walk into her store looking for flower arrangements?”

Lee looked at him quizzically, and Tony handed him the last letter he’d read. Lee glanced it over and then snorted with amusement.

“Do you have any idea how tempted I am to send all these people a glossy five-by-seven of the two of us?” Tony shook his head.

Lee actually grinned at that. “Even better, you’re a wizard. Can’t you curse them or something?”

“Only in my fantasies,” Tony sighed reluctantly.

“That’s the best place.”

Tony reached out to squeeze Lee’s hand to show that he agreed.

They read through the rest of the letters together, laughing at how the two of them were apparently the downfall of western civilization as they knew it. That night was the best sleep Tony had gotten all week, even though Lee did wake him up three times that night still snickering.

***

“Okay,” Lee said as the limo pulled up outside the Daytime Emmys. Lee’s old co-star Marilyn had been nominated for the first time, and they were all there for moral support. “Are you ready for this?”

“Not even close,” Tony sighed.

“Just remember our deal,” Lee grinned.

“I save you from evil wizards; you save me from reporters.” Tony couldn’t help but smile as well in response.

“Right.” Lee put on his meet-the-press face. “Ready now?”

“The sooner we start, the sooner we get it over with.”

“Atta boy.” Lee gave his behind a playful spank before opening the door. The sudden barrage of camera flashes was blinding.

“You do realize that you owe me blowjobs for life for this,” Tony teased as he let Lee take his hand and lead him from the limo.

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Lee whispered back.

And the real truth of it was that Tony wouldn’t have it any other way, either.


End file.
